Impact of off-peak fares on train patronage: a case study from DoT Victoria, pre and post COVID-19
- Publisher:
- Australasian Transport Research Forum
- Publication Type:
- Conference Proceeding
- Citation:
- Australasian Transport Research Forum 2023 Proceedings, 2023, pp. 1-15
- Issue Date:
- 2023
Open Access
Copyright Clearance Process
- Recently Added
- In Progress
- Open Access
This item is open access.
The immense growth of public transportation users (patronage or ridership) makes public
transportation experience excessive demands, especially during peak hours. All governments
worldwide experience extreme demand problems in their public transport systems. Therefore,
policies on managing demands on peak hours are made, such as pricing strategy (on/off-peak
fares). With a pricing strategy, public transportation could utilize its capacity in a balanced
manner. Since Australia's population is growing to 27.55 million in 2027, transportation users
are also increasing with the growing population. This paper presents a detailed analysis of the
impact of fare or policy pre/during the Covid-19 pandemic as a case study from DoT Victoria,
Australia. In the first part of the paper, we start by analyzing the train network, choosing the
most popular train line networks, and undergoing an analysis of the patronage impact of the
off-peak fare during regular traffic periods throughout the COVID-19 pandemic. In the second
part of the paper, we deploy a machine learning approach for predicting patronage numbers
with and without major COVID-disruption and discuss the findings and future
recommendations.
Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: